Ministry asks Additional Chief Secretary to act on major design flaws on Smart City Road in Ludhiana

Acting upon a complaint filed by the Council of Engineers (CoE) regarding major design flaws on Smart City Road, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) has asked Additional Chief Secretary (Urban Development) of the Punjab Municipal Infrastructure Development Company (PMIDC) to take appropriate action in the matter.

The CoE had raised some important issues, including the appointment of the consultant, who was lacking knowledge of basic IRC code for design of roads, and undue benefit given to the contractor by change in work of scheduled items, etc.

The Council of Engineers through its president Er Kapil Dev in the complaint submitted had mentioned that despite raising the issue of major flaws (violation of the IRC code) in design of Smart City Road (Malhar Road), the project started without removing discrepancies, resulting in traffic jams due to missing slipways, illegal parking on cycle track, decrease in width of road, etc, and hence, was against its prime motive.

Now, the work of dismantling/removing RCC balusters and curves made with kerb stones along roadsides, constructed under the project, has been started. Besides such major changes, Ludhiana Smart City Limited company earlier continued to fix interlocking tiles within prohibited areas around trees by going against the directions of the National Green Tribunal (NGT) and now, those tiles are also being removed, resulting in financial losses for the second time.

“Therefore, it’s a matter of investigation for corruption, technical as well as financial audit,” Kapil Dev said.

He questioned how and why the design of such important project having major flaws in violation to the IRC code was designed by the consultant and approved by the SPV and when the matter was highlighted at the time of the commencement of civil works, why such changes/corrections were not made by officials to remove the flaws?

He asked how the consultant, who is not having basic knowledge of IRC codes of civil engineering, of the project was selected and now, why changes are being made without getting prior approval from the higher authorities?

Further in his complaint he stated that why the department did not plan electrical works at the time of finalising the detailed project report, resulting in extra benefit to the contractor due to change in work of scheduled items.

“Were such changes made to give undue benefit to the contractor to save him from the penalty due to delay in the project? The portion of the road has not been constructed but claimed to be completed by Ludhiana Smart City firm. A probe should be conducted into the matter and action be taken,” said Er Kapil Dev.